South-west England

Late work by the pivotal avant-garde painter belies the dark nature of earlier works

Falling short of ambitious hopes but leading the day at Duke’s (25% buyer’s premium) first sale of 2020 was a fine English Golden Age longcase clock.

This 18th century English provincial school full-length portrait depicts the jester Black John. He was in the employ of the famously eccentric John Arscott (1718-88) of the Tetcott estate in Devon, said to be the last man in England to keep a professional jester.

Among the gems spotted in 2092 mixed lots at Stroud Auctions’ (18% buyer’s premium) year-opener on January 8, the best-seller was the final lot.

With an Irish silver ‘seal salver’ gleaming at the first Bearnes Hampton & Littlewood (23% buyer’s premium) sale of the year (ATG No 2427), Italy, China and Russia provided other highlights.

On the death of the monarch, or when a statesman left office, it was required by law that any seals of royal authority be broken and defaced.

Two ‘Frost Fair’ broadsides printed at one of the many stalls set up on the Thames during a hard 18th century winter in which London’s river froze over were sold in a recent sale held by Dominic Winter (20% buyer’s premium).

This pair of silver and enamel cufflinks with the royal cypher of George VI comes in a presentation box by Plante of Bury Street, London.

A trio of five-figure offerings got Salisbury auction house Woolley & Wallis (25% buyer’s premium) off to a great start for 2020.

A trio of pure collectables picked up by UK privates bidders at the Woolley & Wallis (25% buyer’s premium) auction in Salisbury on January 8.

Highlight literally and metaphorically of the Woolley & Wallis sale on January 8 was a pair of ormolu and hardstone-mounted candelabra, superb in themselves and packed with French royal history.

Glyphic art was one of the success stories of 2019. The return to collecting fashion of this once dusty academic field is bringing more hardstone gems to the market.

Found in the roof space of a Devon cottage, an oil painting of a pointer dog in an open field sold for £3400 at Sherborne saleroom Charterhouse (25% buyer’s premium).

An unusual but welcome inclusion to the latest silver and vertu sale at Lawrences of Crewkerne was a medieval walrus ivory tableman or backgammon piece.

It was during the Carter, Stabler and Adams period in the 1920s-30s that some of the most memorable Poole wares were produced. Much of this Art Deco range – red earthenwares covered in a white slip and a semi-matt-glaze before decoration in a variety of Jazz Age patterns – was based on the work of chief designer Truda Carter.

The latest sale at Clarks in Liskeard included a collection of walking canes collected by the late actor Edward Woodward.

The limited, but international, appeal of a remarkable collection of about 350 Victorian hand-painted glass eyes was clear at East Bristol Auctions (18% buyer’s premium).

The New Year sale at Woolley & Wallis in Salisbury included one of the most desirable and celebrated of all Victorian furniture types: a mahogany ‘Jupe’s patent’ radially expanding dining table.

Alongside pieces made in Kinsale, Galway and Waterford, silver from the small County Cork town of Youghal is among the scarcest of all Irish provincial silver. Only a handful of pieces survive that carry the punning town mark of a yawl.